The invention is directed to a ready-for-use sweet dough product which includes dough disposed on and in a tray. The product can be preserved in a refrigerator or freezer. The dough disposed on the tray facilitates handling the product, breaking the dough into smaller pieces for baking into a final product such as cookies, and allows the product to be formed into a predetermined shape.
Ready made cookie doughs already exist on the market. Typically, the dough is refrigerated and packaged either in a cylindrical shape or packaged in a cup. During use, the consumer uses a spoon or a knife to form the cookie in a circular shape prior to baking. This particular cookie dough preparation requires extensive manipulation of the cookie dough prior to use. If the cookie dough is packaged in the form of a block or sheet, then a forming device is needed in order to give the cookie the desired circular form. This cookie dough manipulation, however, leaves remnants of cookie dough pieces which must then be recycled and reshaped if desired. Further, extensive manipulation of some types of dough is not desired, as it may adversely affect the texture of the baked product.
Another conventional product is a frozen cookie dough which is in the form of individual amounts to form single cookies. The amounts are provided by forming dough balls or by cutting the dough into individual pieces. The balls or pieces are then placed adjacent each other on a tray or other support, and are then frozen. The dough pieces, being tacky before freezing, stick to adjacent pieces and freeze into a solid block. During use, the consumer thaws the block and then separates the individual pieces for baking. As the preparation before freezing is somewhat complex, an improvement on these type products is also needed.
The present invention relates to a consumer-friendly, ready-to-bake sweet dough disposed in a tray so that the dough requires only a minimum amount of manipulation during use and which advantageously minimizes or eliminates dough pieces that need to be reshaped or recycled. The sweet dough is preformed by recesses in the tray into shapes to assist in the preparation and baking of the product. The tray facilitates separating the dough into ready to use uncooked dough portions of a predetermined form having a thickness and an upper and a lower surface.
This tray has a top surface and beneficially a plurality of recesses. The recesses each have at least one side for a circle or oval-like shape, or multiple sides for a polygon or other type shape. The sides have a top edge and a bottom edge. The top edge of the at least one side is attached to or continuous with the top surface of the tray. The recess also has a bottom that is attached to or continuous with the bottom edge of the at least one side.
The recess can be in the shape of a fanciful design or can have a fanciful design or decoration embossed thereon.
The side of the recess is beneficially between about 1 mm and about 25 mm in depth, preferably between about 3 and about 15 mm in depth. The embossed design, if any, is beneficially between about 1 mm and about 15 mm in depth, preferably between about 2 and about 8 mm in depth. The recess defines a volume adapted to contain a quantity of dough that, along with dough above the top of the tray, advantageously corresponds to about one serving.
The ready-for-use sweet dough is typically prepared from flour, sugar, a leavening agent, and a fat. The dough is provided in a form ready for baking having grooves, score lines, or a combination thereof which define pieces of dough that are to be broken off and baked into final products, such as cookies, brownies, muffins, a cake, quick bread, or other pastry or bakery products.
At least a portion of the dough is disposed in the recess. If the dough is not a rising dough such as is used to prepare muffins, the dough fills at least 75 percent of the recess. Preferably the dough fills 100 percent of the recess. More preferably, the dough fills 100 percent of the recess and there is excess dough in a layer above the top edge of the recess. This layer of dough can be separated along predetermined lines, where the tray is adapted to bent or to separate to facilitate removal of an individual portion. This dough extending above the top surface of the tray should have a thickness at least 10 percent of the depth of the recesses, preferably at least 30 percent of the depth of the recesses, and more preferably at least 50 percent of the depth of the recesses.
This top layer of dough advantageously includes an imprint of grooves, score lines, or combinations thereof. The imprint should substantially follow the bending areas and defines pieces of the dough to be broken off and baked. By bending the tray, the dough will tend to separate at the grooves or score lines. These grooves or score each have a width of from about 0.5% to about 100% of the thickness of the dough sheet or block and a depth of about 3% to about 95% of the thickness of the dough sheet or block, where the thickness of the dough sheet or block is measured immediately adjacent to the grooves.